Sharon 'sorry' he let Arafat live

The Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, said today that the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, could be a partner in future peace negotiations - but added that he was "sorry" Israel had not killed him when it had the chance.

In an interview with the Israeli newspaper Maariv, he said there was an agreement during the 1982 invasion of Lebanon not to "liquidate" Mr Arafat while he was under siege in Beruit.

"I'm sorry that we didn't," he said. In recent speeches he has accused Mr Arafat of leading a "gang of terrorists", and in the days after September 11 he labelled him "our Bin Laden".

The Palestinian leader has been confined by Israeli tanks to his offices in the West Bank town of Ramallah since an upsurge of violence in December last year.

An adviser to Mr Arafat, Nabil Abu Rdeneh, said the remark was a "provocation".

But Mr Sharon also told Maariv that Mr Arafat could be a partner in peace negotiations if he stamped out terrorist attacks against Israelis. He also reiterated that Palestinian statehood was inevitable - a stance that has sparked criticism from leading figures in his rightwing Likud party.

Mr Sharon was the defence minister at the time of the 1982 invasion, and led the push to drive Mr Arafat and the Palestine Liberation Organisation out of Lebanon. It was during that conflict that his Lebanese Christian militia allies entered refugee camps and massacred between 800 and 1,000 people.

His troops cornered Mr Arafat and the PLO in Beruit, but an internationally brokered agreement allowed them to escape by sea.